Marc Maron Quotes

I worked at comedy clubs - if I can use the term 'work' - for several years. I middled at one point. I never made it; I was never a headliner. I never made enough time to write enough good material, in my opinion.

I love Dallas, Austin and Houston. Why? Because some of the best comedians, like Bill Hicks and Sam Kinison, started their careers in Texas, and because the crowds there are comedy-educated.

Maybe it's because I come from a very utopian world of being a comedian, but I'm used to many live comedy performances going on in any city I'm in, and each of us is trying to be the best at what we do. I don't think of it as a competition so much as a thriving comedy economy.

Something about New York, man: You can do more comedy there probably than you can anywhere in the world. If you're interested in being funny, New York is the place to go.

I want more stand-up comics in prime time. It's great for every comedian.

I like New York, I think you've got some of the best comics in the world here.

I've always liked and appreciated storytellers like Garry Shandling and Bill Cosby - more long-form comedy. So starting in San Francisco, watching all these great comics - Patton Oswalt, Dave Chappelle - you get to see them a bunch, and you go, 'Wow, this is where I need to be.'

We all know showbiz isn't easy, but being a comic - especially being a female comic - can be quite punishing.

Comedians have to write to survive because you don't get cast for your beauty.

I got into comedy so I could stay out all night.

I love comedy; I'm super passionate about it, and thank God it's super in right now to have female empowered comedies.

When I started, there was no comedy community, no comedy industry; there were comedians.

I moved from acting to stand-up because castings are just about what you look like. It doesn't matter if you can act or not. In comedy, no one cares what you look like.

Eddie Murphy was my guy for a long time. My first exposure to 'SNL' was his 'Best Of' VHS, and I would watch it over and over again. He was one of the few people on the show to play with the live elements and engage with the audience.

The development of the comedy club industry destroyed the uniqueness and intimacy of the profession but it also created jobs for comics and bred some great performers.

I didn't become a comedian to work this hard.

After the comedy boom of the '80s, there was a certain formula that comedians had to do and could do in order to be successful touring comedians, and those were mainly observational comedians who had a very strict structure of what made an act, and I think it was very performance oriented.

It seems like when I first started, people got into comedy because they wanted to be good comedians.

Hopefully standup will become special again.

If you want to be a comedian, go out. Do a week in Des Moines, Iowa. Try to make those people laugh.

I was a stand-up comedian for 10 years, if you can believe it. And I gave it up at age 22.

The minute I started doing comedy, the doors opened.

I'm from Oakland and I started doing comedy around 2001.

When I started, I was very deliberate about making friends with people like John Mulaney who were really funny and wanted to go up and do as many open mics as I did.

There are so few jobs for comedians on networks, that taxi TV and elevator TV and all this stuff are what I and every other comedian now are gunning for.